Total pages in book: 31
Estimated words: 28750 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 144(@200wpm)___ 115(@250wpm)___ 96(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 28750 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 144(@200wpm)___ 115(@250wpm)___ 96(@300wpm)
“No, of course not, Mom,” I wheeze, muttering a quick, “Excuse me, on your left,” to the family in front of me before squeezing past the mother and her two young children.
“Mommy! It’s one of Santa’s elves!” the little boy shouts.
I glance over my shoulder, grinning and waving as my mother continues to foretell disaster.
I didn’t choose the elf life, but the elf life chose me, and I don’t want to let any Santa-loving kids down by being less than jolly—even while sprinting through the airport.
“And your father’s worried about the air traffic control situation when you’ll be landing,” Mom says. “The last time we had a snowstorm this bad, there was almost a head-on collision between two incoming planes. It was all over the news. Garrison Cranston should have been fired years ago. No man with glasses that thick should be in charge of a fleet of flying death tubes.”
“We talked about this, Mom. We don’t call them flying death tubes when I’m about to get on one of them. And I’m pretty sure it’s fine for air traffic controllers to wear glasses as long as their distance vision corrects to twenty-twenty. Now, I have to go. The walkway’s about to end. I have to run for real. See you in a couple hours!”
“Don’t forget to throw salt over your shoulder before you board. You did bring salt, didn’t you?” she shouts, loud enough to earn me a strange look from the businessman gaining ground beside me.
“Sure did and will do. Bye, Mom!” I shout back, before adding in a voice for the businessman’s ears only, “She’s superstitious. In a weird way. As far as I can tell, she made the salt thing up, forgot that she made it up, and it somehow became one of our crazy family traditions. But that’s the fun of family, right?”
“Go ahead.” He slows his pace, clearly not in the mood to share in my frazzled breed of holiday cheer.
“Thanks! Happy holidays!” I cruise off the end of the moving walkway and break into a proper jog, my heart hammering as I careen toward gate 54B.
It’s a little regional gate, tucked into a circle of smaller gates at the end of the terminal. So it’s clear from the moment I dash into the abandoned boarding area, where the gate agent is closing the door leading to the jetway, that I’m too late.
“No,” I wheeze, waving a frantic arm at the woman dressed head to toe in the airline’s signature mauve. “I’m here! I’m here! Don’t close it yet. Please, my mother will kill me if I don’t make it home for—” My words end in a panicked screech as I trip over one of my ridiculous shoes and go flying into the air.
Time slows and it feels like I have a full minute to realize I’m on a collision course with the recycling bin.
I have time to note the overflowing plastic bottles at the top, the happy rabbit on the side encouraging folks to recycle, and the wad of gum stuck to the rabbit’s nose by some jerk of a passerby. I have time to think about how gross people can be and how gross gum is and wonder if the gum I swallowed in middle school really stuck around in my intestines for seven years, the way Molly Rapper said it would. Then, I make impact.
Thankfully, my shoulder glances off one side of the bin, avoiding the mess on the rabbit’s nose, but that’s the only bright side. As the heavy blue container tips over and sticky plastic bottles rain down on my head, dislodging the elf cap my producer secured to my hair with industrial strength hair clips, I lift my arms and squeeze my eyes shut, certain the Dobbs’ family holiday is going to have to go on without me.
A beat later, my lids slide open to see the gate agent hovering over me, her brow furrowed. I cross my fingers that I’m about to be the recipient of a Christmas miracle.
Maybe she’s here to tell me that she’ll hold the door for one more minute.
Maybe there’s still a way to get home and soothe my mother’s ruffled feathers before she declares the holiday a disaster and lays the blame at my jingly feet.
“Are you okay, ma’am?” the gate agent asks.
“I’m fine.” I flick a bottle off my chest and force a bright smile. “And I can be on that plane in five seconds flat. I promise.”
Her frown deepens as she pulls the recycling bin back into an upright position. “I’m sorry, ma’am. The flight to Bad Dog Regional Airport was cancelled. Thundersnow.”
“Thundersnow,” I echo, my stomach sinking.
So that wasn’t another one of my mother’s weird, not-based-in-reality-or-physics weather predictions.
“Yes,” the woman says. “And the chance of a bomb cyclone. All flights headed west are cancelled, and I’ll be sleeping in the staff room tonight. No way I’m getting all the way back to Imperial in this storm. If you have a lounge membership, I’d suggest you head there now, before they fill up with other travelers looking for a comfortable place to spend the night.”